Roman Catholic Church in preventing priests from marrying; on the contrary, the tribunals have expressly declared such marriages to be lawful in Belgium.* It may, thirdly, be under the superintendence of an Episcopate formally recognised in its collective capacity by the State, and whose decrees are carried into execution, if resisted, by the process of the civil courts. This is the condition of an Established Church. The Orthodox Greek Church, for instance, is the Established Church in Russia; the United Greek Church, i. e. the Church in union with the See of Rome, is a protected Church. Its local Sees are recognised by the law of the land, but the sanctions of its law are not enforced by the tribunals of the State.

Although the above sketch of the peculiar features of each condition is very imperfect, it may suffice to establish the fact of a real diversity in the three conditions. The practical question resulting from their acknowledged existence seems to be this: whether the Pope can, motu proprio, without the consent of the Sovereign of the land, convert the condition of toleration into that of protection.

It may be thought, at first sight, that such is not a fair statement of the question involved in the present measure of Pope Pius IX.; that the law of the land is not asked, as it were, to recognise the act of the Pope, but that the whole proceeding merely concerns the forum conscientiæ. Now if the proceedings of his Holiness involved no violation of the law of the land, there might be some force in the argument, because it is possible that the political institutions of a particular country might dispense with the observation of the ordinary rules, which have hitherto

* Thus the marriage of an Ex-Curé was celebrated civilly at Gand, on May 29. 1850.

been observed by the Pope in regard to his dealings with other sovereign states of Europe. The circumstance of religious separation cannot affect the question; for even within the last four years the consent of the government of the Protestant Canton of St. Gall, in Switzerland, was held to be a necessary condition to enable Pope Pius IX. to erect a See for a Roman Catholic Bishop in the capital of that Canton.

But the institutions of England, in the first place, do not dispense with the ordinary rules: so far from it, that the execution of the Brief by which the change has been effected is itself a heinous offence against the Statute Law; and further, a provision of the Brief itself entails a positive breach of the law of the land. Now these are matters which concern the forum externum, and no plea can avail to bring them within the legitimate domain of conscience. They are, in the language of the statute of Henry VIII., contrary to right.

And here again it may be observed, that the circumstances of Ireland form no precedent for England. In Ireland there has always been a Roman Catholic Church; in England there has been ever since the Reformation a Roman Catholic Mission. In Ireland there have always been local Roman Catholic Bishops; in England there have been no local Bishops, but Vicars Apostolic. In Ireland the Pope has always appointed to the ancient Sees; in England he has established new Sees. In Ireland the Canon Law has always been in force amongst the Roman Catholics; in England it has been re-introduced by the Brief of Pope Pius IX.

But it may be said that the law may ignore the Brief, and the measures consequent on its publication. If the law were perfectly silent as to Papal Rescripts

and Bishops' Sees, the tribunals might remain mute, and so far ignore all the facts connected with and consequent on the publication of the Brief. But the law cannot ignore its own violation, any more than a man can ignore his own death. It may be a question whether the state of the law is perfectly satisfactory, whether some change in its provisions may not be desirable, or even absolutely necessary; but the Judges of the land cannot refuse to take cognisance of the law, if the question of its violation should be raised in Westminster Hall.

In Ireland, indeed, an established custom may be set up against a positive law; and although no custom can set aside a statute, still there is an equity of construction in cases of conflicting sanctions, which the common sense of mankind inclines to uphold. But where the established custom has been not contrary to, but in accordance with, the Statute Law, as in England, what equity of construction can be invoked to palliate the execution of the present Brief?

But it is said, that if what is permitted in Ireland is prohibited in England, the unity of the Church of England and Ireland will be thereby weakened.

Now the Act of Union between England and Ireland (39 & 40 Geo. 3. c. 67.) provides, "That it be the fifth Article of Union, that the Churches of England and Ireland, as now by law established, be united into one Protestant Episcopal Church, to be called the United Church of England and Ireland, and that the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the said United Church shall be, and shall remain in full force for ever, as the same are now by law established for the Church of England; and that the continuance and preservation of the United Church, as the Established Church of England and Ireland,

shall be deemed and taken to be an essential and fundamental part of the Union: and that in like manner, the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the Church of Scotland, shall remain and be preserved as the same are now established by law, and by the Acts for the Union of the two kingdoms of England and Scotland."

The substance of this article refers mainly to the internal constitution of the Protestant Church of Ireland, and establishes a perfect identity of doctrine, worship, discipline, and government, between the two Churches, uniting them into one Protestant Episcopal Church: it further provides that it shall be a fundamental principle of the Union to maintain the United Church as the Established Church. In other words, the State is bound to aid the law of the Church, whenever the process of the civil courts should be required. Such is the only necessary principle involved in State-Establishment. The temporalities are accidents, which vary in their character in different states; but wherever the Church is established, there indeed its laws are maintained by the secular arm. These facts, it must be repeated, are matters of history, not of speculation.

Further, if we examine the condition of things in such of the great European states as present any features of similarity to the circumstances of the British Empire, we shall find, that it has not been thought necessary in Russia, for instance, or in Prussia, or in Denmark, to assimilate the heart of the empire to the extremities, because it has been found impracticable to change the condition of the extremities. On the contrary, where the conditions have been different, it has been thought reasonable that the system of legislation should be accommodated to those

conditions. Thus, in the dominions of the Em peror of Austria, before the Charter of 4th of March, 1849, we find in the Tyrol* the Roman Catholic Church was established to the exclusion of all others; in Styria and Carinthia the Roman Catholic Church was dominant, but the Protestant communions were tolerated; in Hungary the Roman Catholic Church was. the dominant Church of the kingdom, but the Greek and the Protestant Churches were protected; in Transylvania the Roman Catholic and the Reformed Churches were all alike protected, whilst the Greek Church was tolerated. It is false statesmanship to ignore facts, and it is equally false statesmanship to overlook practical diversities of condition in the subject-matter which invites legislation.

*It may be within the recollection of the reader, that the inhabitants of certain villages in the Zillerthal, in the Upper Tyrol, renounced communion with the Roman Catholic Church, and were obliged, by the laws of the Tyrol, to emigrate. They were offered, by the Emperor Francis, an asylum in other parts of the empire, where the Roman Catholic Church was not exclusively established, but they preferred to emigrate into Prussian Silesia. The cause of their separation from Rome was singular in itself, whilst it illustrates in a remarkable manner the part, which the Pope personally filled in the religious system of a simple-minded peasantry. They had been led to adopt the extraordinary notion, that the reigning Pope was not the true Pope, for that Pius VII. was still alive, and in a dungeon at Rome. The Emperor listened with great kindness to their representations, and sent a deputation of the chiefs of the villages to Rome, in order to satisfy themselves that their scruples were unfounded. On their return, the deputies had an interview at Vienna with the Emperor, when, in answer to his inquiries whether they had seen the actual Pope, and satisfied themselves that he was the true Pope, they replied that they had seen him, but that he was not the true Pope; for that the true Pope, as the successor of the Apostles, knew all languages, whereas the Pope, whom they had seen, could neither speak nor understand German, and was obliged to make use of an interpreter!